The above-mentioned related application describes an arrangement by means of which calls to a telephone customer may be originated by the dialing of a single number, yet allowing the customer to specify the disposition of calls based on an evaluation of selected call parameters at the time calls are initiated. This method is achieved by providing a customer defined program, a plurality of independent and discrete call processing capabilities in each originating office, and by executing some or all of the capabilities in an order specified by the customer program on a per call basis to achieve the desired telephone service for the customer.
As a practical matter, it is difficult and inefficient to require that all offices be able to perform all capabilities at any given time. This may be due to the unavailability of certain hardware features in some offices, to the cost of deployment of certain features in all offices, to different generic programs in different offices, and even to certain data that may be available in one office and unavailable in another. As one example, a customer may wish to specify that incoming calls be routed to alternative destinations based upon information supplied by a caller in the form of additional dialed digits. In this case, an appropriate prompting announcement must be made to instruct the caller. An airline, for example, may wish to instruct a caller to dial "1" for flight information and "2" for reservations. However, the office handling a call to the airline may not be equipped with the hardware capability necessary for making an appropriate prompting announcement to the caller, or perhaps the data defining the specific announcement is unavailable at the serving office.
It is a problem then to provide universal and homogeneous service to customers in a manner contemplated by the method and invention disclosed in the aforementioned Asmuth et al application irrespective of the location of callers and offices serving calls.